How does actinium-225 decay?
Actinium-225 has a half-life of 10 days and decays by alpha emission. It is part of the neptunium series, for it arises as a decay product of neptunium-237 and its daughters such as uranium-233 and thorium-229.
What type of radiation does actinium-225 emit?
Actinium-225 has a 10-day half-life, decaying by the emission of alpha particles. Its short-lived daughter isotopes emit only alpha and beta particles with no high-energy gamma rays. This isotope can thus deliver high-energy radiation to a tumour without greatly affecting the surrounding tissue.
What is actinium-225 used for?
Fortunately, scientists have figured out how to harness actinium-225’s power for good. They can attach it to molecules that can home in on only cancer cells. In clinical trials treating late-stage prostate cancer patients, actinium-225 wiped out the cancer in three treatments. for leukemia, melanoma, and glioma.
What does actinium decay into?
Actinium-227, which is one of the decay products of uranium-235, has a 21.8-year half-life and in turn decays almost entirely to thorium-227, but about 1 percent decays to francium-223. This whole disintegration chain with its branches is called the actinium series.
What is the half-life of AC 225?
9.92 days
Recently the National Nuclear Data Center (NNDC), managed by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science for Nuclear Physics, updated the half-life value of actinium-225 (Ac-225) to 9.92 days. This is a change from the previously used value of 10.0 days.
Where does actinium 225 come from?
The element was discovered by Debierne in 1899 and Giesel in 1902 [9]. Actinium occurs naturally in association with uranium radionuclides and 225Ac can be obtained either from the decay of 233U or from the neutron transmutation of 226Ra by successive n,γ capture decay reactions via 227Ac, 228Th to 229Th [10–12].
Where is actinium used?
Actinium-225 is used in medicine to produce Bi-213 in a reusable generator or can be used alone as an agent for radio-immunotherapy. It is found only in traces in uranium ores as 227-Ac, an α and β emitter with a half-life of 21.773 years.
What is an interesting fact about actinium?
Word origin: The word actinium comes from the Greek aktis or aktinos, which means beam or ray. Discovery: Actinium has two independent discoverers: Andre Debierne, who found it in 1899, and F. Giesel, who discovered it in 1902. Actinium has 36 isotopes, none of which are stable.
What is actinium used for in everyday life?
Actinium is a silvery radioactive metallic element. Actinium-225 is used in medicine to produce Bi-213 in a reusable generator or can be used alone as an agent for radio-immunotherapy. Actinium in the environment. It is found only in traces in uranium ores as 227-Ac, an α and β emitter with a half-life of 21.773 years.
What Colour is actinium?
Actinium is a soft, silvery-white radioactive metal. It glows blue in the dark because its intense radioactivity excites the air around it.
What is actinium most commonly used for?
It is about 150 times as radioactive as radium, making it valuable as a neutron source. Otherwise it has no significant industrial applications. Actinium-225 is used in medicine to produce Bi-213 in a reusable generator or can be used alone as an agent for radio-immunotherapy.
What are the decay properties of actinium 225?
Except for minuscule quantities arising from this decay chain in nature, 225 Ac is entirely synthetic . The decay properties of actinium-225 are favorable for usage in targeted alpha therapy (TAT); clinical trials have demonstrated the applicability of radiopharmaceuticals containing 225 Ac to treat various types of cancer.
How is actinium 225 used in the treatment of cancer?
The decay properties of actinium-225 are favorable for usage in targeted alpha therapy (TAT); clinical trials have demonstrated the applicability of radiopharmaceuticals containing 225 Ac to treat various types of cancer. However, the scarcity of this isotope resulting from its necessary synthesis in cyclotrons limits its potential applications.
How are the isotopes of actinium-225 determined?
They separate actinium-225 from the other materials using a similar technique to the one they use to produce “milk” from their thorium cow. They determine which isotopes are in the final product by measuring the isotopes’ radioactivity and masses.
Where does the production of actinium-225 take place?
BNL’s Linear Accelerator and LANL’s Neutron Science Center are two of them. While both mainly focus on other nuclear research, they create plenty of excess protons for producing isotopes. The new actinium-225 production process starts with a target made of thorium that’s the size of a hockey puck.